Bible Strands
Proverbs 25:26
Like a muddied spring or a polluted well is a righteous man who gives way to the wicked.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The verse sits within a collected body of wisdom instructions, positioned between two nature similes that contrast moral stability with physical refreshment and excess.
The words — The Hebrew מָט (mat) means "sways" or "yields," and צַדִּיק (tza.Dik) denotes a "righteous person," directly linking moral compromise to the physical act of tipping.
The thread — The text supplies no external cross-references for this specific water metaphor; it stands isolated within its immediate literary neighbors, Proverbs 25:25 and Proverbs 25:27, which frame it with unrelated similes about distant news and overindulgence.
Why it lands — The text states that a righteous person who yields to the wicked becomes functionally useless, like a contaminated water source, demanding that readers prioritize moral integrity over social accommodation.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
A righteous man falling down before the wicked is as a troubled fountain, and a corrupt spring.
Cross-references
- Ezekiel 34:18 Is it not enough for you to feed on the good pasture? Must you also trample the rest of the pasture with your feet? Is it not enough for you to drink the clear waters? Must you also muddy the rest with your feet?
- Genesis 4:8 Then Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let us go out to the field.” And while they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.
- 1 Samuel 22:14 Ahimelech answered the king, “Who among all your servants is as faithful as David, the king’s son-in-law, the captain of your bodyguard and honored in your house?
- 2 Chronicles 24:21 But they conspired against Zechariah, and by order of the king, they stoned him in the courtyard of the house of the LORD.
- Matthew 26:69 Meanwhile, Peter was sitting out in the courtyard, and a servant girl came up to him. “You also were with Jesus the Galilean,” she said.
- 1 Thessalonians 2:15 who killed both the Lord Jesus and their own prophets and drove us out as well. They are displeasing to God and hostile to all men,
- Ezekiel 32:2 “Son of man, take up a lament for Pharaoh king of Egypt and say to him: ‘You are like a lion among the nations; you are like a monster in the seas. You thrash about in your rivers, churning up the waters with your feet and muddying the streams.’
- Matthew 23:34 Because of this, I am sending you prophets and wise men and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify, and others you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town.
- Acts 7:52 Which of the prophets did your fathers fail to persecute? They even killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One. And now you are His betrayers and murderers—
- Revelation 17:6 I could see that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints and witnesses for Jesus. And I was utterly amazed at the sight of her.